As swine flu continued to spread its tentacles in the country, Union Health Ministry officials have attributed the spurt in H1N1 flu cases to temperature dipping to single digits even in coastal States like Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. The officials also cited lack of awareness as one of the reasons for the alarming rise in cases apart from the casual approach of the medical community that has been failing to spot the virus symptoms in time.
Meanwhile, swine flu deaths in the country continued unabated with 43 more people perishing, taking the death toll to 743 on Friday, even as the number of H1N1 cases inched towards the 12,000 mark. Given the alarming situation, the Government ordered additional testing kits and Oseltamivir drugs to tackle the virus.
The Union Health Ministry was also in the process of procuring 2,000 swine flu vaccines especially for health care workers who are at maximum risk of catching swine flu from infected patients. According to the Union Health Ministry States like Gujarat, Rajasthan, Delhi, Maharashtra and Telangana witnessed a rise in number of swine flu cases and the figure of those infected with H1N1 virus rose from 11,071 on Thursday to 11,955 till February 19.
"We have placed orders for procuring swine flu testing kits worth Rs84 lakh and Tamiflu tablets and syrup estimated to cost Rs30 lakh to keep stocks of medicines. There is no dearth of medicines and hospitals are equipped to deal with the disease," said a senior Union Health Ministry official. The national Capital on Friday witnessed three more deaths due to the deadly swine flu, taking the death toll in the city from six to nine. One of the people who died was a pregnant woman who had been admitted to the lNJP Hospital.
As cases of swine flu continued to rise Union Health Ministry officials blamed the weather, lack of awareness and the casual approach of the medical community for the pandemic. "If the rise in cases has been due to weather conditions being favourable for the spread of the virus in States like Rajasthan and Telangana, I would say the medical community there has been equally responsible for the higher number of deaths. They failed to make the people aware of the symptoms and patients reached hospitals after much damage had been done," said VM Katoch of the Department of Health Research of the Health Ministry.
He said that in comparison, people in Delhi were more aware of the symptoms and that has helped them get early treatment. On the reason for the virus spreading to States like Nagaland and Jammu & Kashmir, he said it could be due to migration of people infected by the virus. Katoch said the spurt in cases was also due to the fact that more cases were being reported this time. Katoch said that the samples tested by the National Centre for Disease Control and Pune-based National Institute of Virology has made it clear that the strain which is causing the flu this time is the same as the one that caused the 2009 outbreak, for which vaccines are available.
Randeep Guleria, an internal medicine expert at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), said that there was no need to panic as it was a seasonal influenza which will subside with the rising temperature. "There is no study which shows that the virus has developed resistance to the existing medicine Tamiflu," he said. On the reason for the high number of cases, he said that the H1N1 flu is a respiratory disease which spreads through droplet infections and that most deaths are occurring in patients with low immunity. Also, he said, decreasing temperatures along with humidity pave way for the virus to spread further causing infections. The conditions will only improve once the affected areas of the country experience consistent warmer days.